


Mother Dearest

by Val_Ritz



Category: Homestuck
Genre: AU, F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-22
Updated: 2013-06-22
Packaged: 2017-12-15 18:20:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/852597
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Val_Ritz/pseuds/Val_Ritz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The snapshots come in bursts, and they begin on a summer night...</p>
            </blockquote>





	Mother Dearest

**Author's Note:**

> AU where Karkat is found at Rose's doorstep as an infant and she raises him. Very very very mild language in sparing locations.

It doesn't look like much; just a little bundle of grey cloth. Rose Lalonde, for her part, is less concerned about the object itself, and more about the piercing shriek it seems to be producing. It's not until she picks it up that she notices that it's alive. A troll child- wiggler, as she recalls. The real question is why it- he- is on her doorstep. She closes the door, and a new question appears in the form of a small gunmetal-grey pendant around the child's neck. “Cancer,” she murmurs. “Perhaps that's your name. A tad unoriginal. How about... Karkat?” She gives a faint smile and resolves to call Dave the next morning. Having a brother working at IKEA has its benefits, after all.

“Listen, I appreciate the fact that we're siblings and all, but do you really have to call me every time you need new furniture? I'm feeling less like your darling brother and more like some sort of loveseat lady of the night,” Dave complains. Rose just rolls her eyes. “It's your nephew's first birthday, he needs a new recuperacoon. IKEA seems to be one of the only places to have a full line of said furniture. Moreover, wonder of wonders, I seem to have a dear brother named David employed at IKEA. Consider it a gift.” He grumbles about it some more, but Dave is for his part mollified- at least until he has to adjust a nut inside the recuperacoon and clips his head on the lip with a shout of “OW, FUCK!” Rose shushes him just in time to hear a small voice from the other room giggle and call out “Fuck!” The wonder of his first word is somewhat dampened by the beating Rose gives her brother for teaching it to him.

“Mama! Bedtime!” Rose can't help but smile and rub her eyes as she turns from her laptop to face the tiny three-year-old troll in Squiddle-print feetie pajamas and sporting a teasing frown. “My my, it is rather late. I don't suppose you have time for a bedtime story,” she says. True to their practiced ritual, he tugs at her skirt and begs her to please, please read him just one, and true to their practiced ritual she acquiesces. After a few minutes of the inscrutable text that makes up the manuscript for her latest novel in progress- the working title Complacency of the Learned has its merits- he's snoring soundly. Rose contemplates the merits of going back to her desk to write some more, but reluctantly admits she is about as tired as he is.

A crack of thunder rattles the windows, jolting Rose from the threshold of sleep. She sighs and sits up in her silk nightgown, pushing back the thick down comforter and reaching for her glass of water on the nightstand. Hoping that this time the storm would let her get to sleep before playing a rousing drum solo on the atmosphere, she re-settles herself. A click of the door opening and closing makes her seriously consider the ramifications of getting fall-down drunk, but it's short-lived as the covers shift and a small body curls itself around hers. Through the sound of falling rain she barely makes out a whisper. “Don't worry Mama, I'll make sure the thunder stays away.” It might be the warmth, it might be the microscopic droplets of sopor slime on his skin, but she swears it's the best night's sleep she's ever had.

The sauce is a tad underseasoned. “Karkat, can you get me the salt and pepper?” A small hand fused to her floral-print housewife apron- a birthday present from her dear brother- extricates itself to fetch the requested items. “Here Mama.” She takes the shakers with a small smile and stirs a dash or two of each into the simmering marinara. “Is the lozen... blas... la-zah-nyah done yet?” Karkat asks for the umpteenth time. “Not yet, we still have to put it together and bake it. Very soon, hm?” He nods with a rather impudent pout. It is a rather productive Sunday afternoon, although Rose suspects by the end that her assistant has more marinara on his shirt than in the lasagna. Somehow it still manages to be spectacular, and they eat like royalty. Karkat says afterward that he feels like “his stomach is going to fall out of his ass,” and Rose doesn't have the heart to ground him. She has plenty of heart to give Dave a piece of her mind.

Normally she reads for a few hours before waking up proper, but she doesn't think Karkat knows that. This makes the clattering of dishes and concentrating mumblings of a five-year-old trying to get through the door somewhat unexpected. “Karkat, what are you...?” She trails off at the sight of a breakfast tray loaded with what looks like a full loaf's worth of toast, a carton of orange juice, and a (luckily empty) glass which appears to have toppled over onto its side into a stick of butter. A muffled cry of “Happy Father's Day!” can distinctly be heard behind the mountain of toast before it's lowered over her blanketed legs. She can't help but crack a smile at the exultant face of a child who has done something nobody expected. “Karkat, honey. Thank you, but I thought you knew that I'm your mother, not your father.” His smile is replaced by a slight pout. “You do both jobs, so you get both days! I even had Uncle Dave show me how to make toast without it lighting on fire even though lighting it on fire is fun and makes the fire alarm yell at me.” She never admits it, but a tear comes to her eye as she ruffles his hair and makes an effort to salvage the sunken glass.

Rose's heart falls into her stomach as soon as the door slams and she hears the sobbing. With an alacrity she discovered is inherent in the position of mother, she scoops up her distraught progeny and rocks him slowly. “Karkat, dear,” she says as evenly and calmly as possible, “what seems to be the problem, hmm?” A few choked mumbles amidst sobs and hacking coughs answer her. This is serious; Rose sits gently down in the leather armchair in her parlor and rocks slowly, waiting for Karkat's sobs to subside. After roughly ten minutes she asks him again. “V-vriska...” he begins, and she closes her eyes. Of course it would be her. “S-she... I made a picture of you and she... she th-threw it in the toilet!” His sobbing redoubles, and Rose suppresses the urge to storm over to the Serket house and burn it down. Instead, she continues to hold him close, hushing him and explaining that Vriska's lack of a stable and responsible parental figure means that she's very afraid, and that she hides that behind a facade of power and bravado. She doesn't find it exceedingly out of form to also inform Karkat that he's a strong, handsome young troll and that she suspects this tragedy can be remedied by judicious application of milk and chocolate chip cookies. On this last point especially he concurs.

The tears on her face feel like betrayal. Her mother shouldn't have this kind of effect on her after all these years, but she supposes now that she's gone... Now that she's gone she doesn't know what to suppose anymore. Rose chokes back a sob as she readies herself for bed, and admittedly the warm confines of her comforter live up to their moniker quite well. It's not until she finally thinks she's done crying that the door opens briefly to admit a shaft of soft yellow and closes again. She feels the warmth of another body in with her, and a familiar whisper. “Don't worry Mama. I'll make sure the thunder stays away.” It's secret, it's quiet, but it's also a shared moment that neither of them ever forget as long as they live.

Speaking of which, Rose thinks with a small mental laugh, she's about to make that statement true. She opens her eyes to a small gathering around her bed. “Hey Mama,” Karkat murmurs, “how are you feeling?” Rose gives her trademark inscrutable smile. “Why I feel fantastic. Quite chipper, really,” she replies in the only whisper she has strength left to produce. Karkat smiles. Vriska, standing beside him with her hand on the head of a small troll, does not. Instead, she crosses to Rose's bedside and takes her hand with a look of deep sadness. Rose squeezes as hard as she can, which amounts to a barely detectable tightening of her grip, and turns to the tall young troll with the barest wingtips of gray over his ears. His lavender tie makes her smile again. “Karkat...” “Yeah Mama?” “You be good to this girl. If you don't I'm going to string you up by your ears.” He grins, a single tear running down his face. “Yes mother dearest.” “Good...” He leans down over her and kisses her cheek, and she takes the opportunity to whisper to him. He never repeats it, and neither does she. She takes another look up at his face before closing her eyes. Her face is framed in white hair and bears a hint of a smile, an echo of a summer night and a grey bundle with a shrill voice.


End file.
